


(Got to) Keep Moving Forward and Press On

by Somecallmemichelle



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Gen, Internalised Transphobia, Reflection, Trans Female Character, transgender link
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-03
Updated: 2019-02-24
Packaged: 2019-10-21 12:16:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 10,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17642627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Somecallmemichelle/pseuds/Somecallmemichelle
Summary: When Link awoke after 100 years, she didn't feel much, except an overwhelming sense of self. A female self. Though that doesn't change, things might be toughter than she expected...





	1. Chapter 1

This whole hero of time thing was growing pretty old.   
  
She did not speak, for the fact her voice came out deep upset her more than the state of the land, or any losses she had known. Even her grunts of exertion, where she pushed, pulled, wielded and moved were tinged with the strange after effect of pushing her voice upwards, so that it came from the throat and not the chest. Not an easy task when she rolled and cut around, but a welcomed one. It lead to less thinking, and less pain her chest.   
  
Link sighed, as, once more, her weapon broke. Parts of her mind yelled at her that perhaps she had used too much strength, that she had been too brutish. She didn’t think herself to be that well defined - more than thinking that, she hoped she didn’t - and yet the weapon had broken once more, which made a pretty good analogy to how broken she felt. Guilt consuming her as much as testosterone ran through her veins.   
  
It was best to keep busy, after all. She had pushed who knew how many weapons into her sack, the old and weathered item doing a poor job at holding them. Some protruded out, as part of her protruded out, and she couldn’t help herself, she took a look back and she frowned. It was harsh, and stormy, out there, and she barely hung there. But then the same had been true of most her life, so far.   
  
When she had awoken - like a fish out of water, gasping, she had felt her mind free of such worries, however momentarily. For those brief moments she hadn’t worried about the fact her chest was bare, or that her nails were cut - as was fit of a man. She hadn’t even worried about the fact she was in place unknown and that time had taken its tool on everything but her.   
  
That had quickly changed however, as voices spoke out to her, and her mission became clear. As clear as the name the one she called her princess used to refer to her.  _ Link _ . What was in a name? She couldn’t help but feel a sense of revolt at the fact that single word, so easily replicated by scribbles on the dirt, or burned into metal, carved into stone, could so aptly describe her.   
  
Not that she was of whole. Not that she felt apt. There was so much about her that she could not yell, that she could not describe, weighting her as if she were to herd sheep, as if she were to carry stone and  water up a creek.   
  
She couldn’t help the feeling of scorn she felt as she pressed on, onto the unknown. That things had changed became evidently clear as she moved to a much different Hyrule than the one she had left - who knew how long ago. That expectations on her had increased - well, that was a no brainer, given what her princess said. But that with which she was referred to also hadn’t - that was not as welcome a surprise.   
  
She shouldn’t have been surprised, as she had never really vocalised such desires out loud. Joining the battle, hoping for a better future, she had expected to defend the land, she hadn’t expected her wildest, and most hidden desire to be known and accepted. That magic was common amongst Zelda’s court, and that she had seen it filled her imagination with possibilities, but she had always been far too quiet, and far too quickly shamed, to mention it.    
  
Instead she had grown used to the sword, to the shield, and to the armor. She had grown used to taking orders, and she had done her best, much as she desired otherwise, to become the man Hyrule expected -and needed her to be.   
  
Was it selfish that she was relieved? That the fact hundreds of years had passed meant that she had no longer no one alive to call her a he? Link felt a tad guilty about it, for she knew it to be an uncommon perspective. To have lost everything she had called familiar and everything she had known and to call it a good thing? It made her seem a tad -   
  
Link didn’t have the word for it, not one she could come up, but her mind provided her with generous options, dozens of negative ones. Destroying the evil forces that plagued her homeland had become routine, and let her with many a thought to have. Sometimes she wondered if she was not the real monster in the situation?   
  
It was not, she thought, as if it were common for men to feel in such ways. If there ever had been some to feel, they had kept it to themselves. It was not proper, nor was it something she did feel like she could share.   
  
Much less in the vast land where none dare live anymore, overtaken by creatures and foes alike.   
  
Truthfully, she didn’t feel like any light that would shine upon the kingdom. How could she when she lacked clarity in her whole life, and her own existence was that of a - and again her mind provided her with plenty of options. - She felt that it was not up to her to shed light onto any place nor person.

 

Much less in such a spot or place where she was to be remembered. _ A hero _ , that was what she had been called. Was that to be her fate? Remembered to all of history as a man, a male? Somehow the thought didn’t much appeal to her. It didn’t appeal to her any more than any option she had.   
  
She had hoped, more than anything else, than when she woke, her form would be the one she had desired. That her chest - bare, yes - would reveal more than the flatness she associated with the fields. She had had no reason to hope that, but it was a common occurrence. As if the magic that filled the land could take shape and form on her. Her own princess - She had often been hailed as a healer, a gentle, kind soul that could only be described as perceptive.   
  
But what of her wound? What of her thoughts, uncommon in the common day to day? He had seen Zelda take to remove spear and arrow’s tips, but the one thought that pierced far deeper than that wasn’t so easily removed, so easily fixed. She didn’t even know if she wanted it fix.   
  
It was as she took rest on a tree stump - her fingernails dirty, her hair long, her lips cracked, that she could better reflect on that. However much she walked, however much she ran and climbed, she had never been able to escape it. If there was a fix it wasn’t present in the stones that she collected.   
  
She considered herself lucky, though her trials were many, and expectations were high, she had been been a witness to much that amazed her. The earth had changed, and so had the rivers and while it hadn’t been necessarily for the better, every time she ran across a changed valley, a stumped forest, she couldn’t help but take in the change with amazement.   
  
And yet, though much had changed, even more remained the same. That, she could safely say, by the way her princess had referred to her, that was something she didn’t doubt. It was obvious.   
  
Sometimes she wondered if she was at fault for not mentioning it, sometimes she wondered if the fact she was so important - not by her own estimate but by what some had told her, expectations placed upon her shoulders, a burden to bear - could lead to a better placement or position. If she had never mentioned it, how could one deduct it?   
  
She was aware that, in the past, talks that brought her name up, even being called, ended with her wincing. With her retracting onto herself. She didn’t speak anymore, she hadn’t in quite some time, but still, her position was that of a servant.   
  
For she had walked who knew how many leagues and miles, for she had crossed the entire region and she hadn’t met anyone she could  safely call a friend, or a confidant. She had met creatures with human like intelligence, maybe even far more, she had met with plenty - but none she thought she could speak with.

 

Sometimes she wondered if there were tales about her, a silent terror, wielder of several magical items, shaggy and unkempt. That she had walked through tundra and desert and that she sometimes stopped to pick flowers.   
  
She would hope that was the case. She was multifaceted, and her prowess in combat was undeniable, but how could the rogue forces of darkness, the ones who answered to the dark wizard himself get her any more wrong than her own princess had? Sometimes Link pushed her shoulders and swallowed, pretended she didn’t much care.    
  
She didn’t know if she was happy that none had commented on her habit of flower picking, or if she was disappointed about the fact. She hadn’t thought it a clue to her true identity, no more than bashing enemies with the hilt of a sword made her into a bloodthirsty warrior, she just enjoyed it. And though it was probably a worthless occupation, something more to take her time, while she gathered resources and the strength to confront Ganon, she didn’t curse herself for it.   
  
Losing her memory had been interesting...it hadn’t lasted long, but there were things she could not miss. The fact that she was female, a she, was one of them. That her princess seeked to remind her of who she was - no, no who she was, but who she should be - that felt terrible. Like a betrayal, a sudden hit to the stomach. As likely to get her down as any serious wound.   
  
She had found fairies in their fountains, and she had long since learned that they did not heal her rampant thoughts, or her desire. That her tiredness was removed, her wounds scrapped off, and the dirt pushed by the water, she could see. That which she considered herself - on a good day - or dreaded admitting on a bad day - that didn’t change.

 

It was hard. In that she shut it all inside of her. Not talking as much as a way to keep her voice - which had changed to the worse in her opinion - as well as to not yell out her wishes. A protection. And sometimes anger came easy to her, and sometimes she smacked things harder than she should. She had the weapon shards to prove it. She could blame it on the poor craftsmanship of the weapons all she wanted.

  
And yet, she didn’t give up. She didn’t stop She kept moving forward. Away from her worries, away from her fears. That they would catch up eventually was not a surprise, hurtful as it might have been. That she knew the ways of the sword, as well as how much she wished to be called a she, wasn’t either   
  


The girl lifted herself up. Though her sleep was unruly and her thoughts were messy she couldn’t yet stop. The area was cleared, but that did not mean much, in the long run, for when she had hang glided there, she had seen many an area in need of restoration.   
  
Through flying she had thought she could forget her worries. How many a time had she craved just being able to take hold and fly, leave her worries behind? To soar in the air had been a dream come true.   
  
But now she knew better. She had thought that perhaps with all the time that had bassed she could form a new identity, be herself.  And while that pressed heavily on her mind, she hadn’t yet had the courage.   
  
Ahead, some sort of construction arose. Wood formed habitations. She did not know what she was going to find there. Nor if she was going to talk, or introduce herself. She did not know how she could or would, even if she were to introduce herself. As Link, name she hated, as Linkle, name she had been playing with?   
  
But she could hope. And while she had hope she had everything.   
  
She pressed forward, on the way to what she, in her mind, called a village.    
  
  
  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Link wasn’t feeling it.

 

Really that was not the biggest problem with the situation as she saw it, but the fact that she wasn’t feeling it really contributed to her own moody mood. That the change she brought upon the world, that by releasing it of the forces of evil, that by doing it she was bettering it for her didn’t matter much in her head.   
  
Not that she had much of a choice. Fate, destiny, and circumstance all seemed to have conspired to make her responsible for it. Silent, she had always sort of tried to remain in the background. She was skilled with a sword, for sure, and there wasn’t much to bombs, just throw them at things and stand back, but that hadn’t made her a top soldier as much as pure chance. She didn’t even know what  _ “It” _ , was anyhow. She felt a sense of obligation towards the kingdom and her princess, of course, but that meant little.

  
Or well, what was left of the kingdom anyhow. She was but a man - and she winced, at the saying, because it would be much more accurate to say she was only a female, but that sounded wrong and diminished the accomplishments of all females she had known. What was an attempt at inclusion, an attempt to stand with those she admired, to emulate them, not mimic them but rather be herself.

 

Even if such women she admired were gone, she could still learn from how she had observed them. Stealthily, almost creepily. She hadn’t come quite as far to observe them denude, but she had observed their acts, the small ways they picked things up, and smiled softly, the way they had been polite but firm. “Dandily” came to mind.   
  
Link knew she wasn’t fooling anyone, least of all herself, she knew that, though life - and her own decisions - had pushed her on a different path than the training given to ladies of the court - when there had been a court - or to those which were considered nobility, that did not mean that her ways were the correct ones. She had only had to look at lady Impa, or even her own Princess. Link had observed them many a time, fascination mixed with jealousy.    
  
Though she had taken to mixing and matching, in what could be considered a foolish attempt, to grasp femininity, the truth was, Link thought her attempts to have been futile. She couldn’t blame anyone but herself for that. She had had a job to do, as she did have a job to do at that moment. Even if sword fighting, and horse riding, and bomb tossing didn’t take the entirety of her day - which it often did - reasons were hard to come by to explore chambers and rooms already occupied.   
  
Link felt as one of the criminals of the land whenever she sneaked a peek. She felt, truly, that in catching grasps of privacy and a world to which she had not been privy to, she was, or had been breaking not only the law but any possible code of ethic she had adhered to. After all, she was supposed to protect them - to keep them safe, while they addressed her as sir, and were safe in the illusion - or reality, she couldn’t tell, or her male self.   
  
Perhaps it had been foolish to remember all of that,  when 100 or more years had passed. It didn’t really matter - not when she had never been caught. Surely measures had been in place to stop any peeping, but if they had she had never encountered them, whether by pure luck or dumb chance.

 

There was that word again, chance. Link would often rebel against odds and chances, she had to. It shouldn’t have been feasible, not realistic at all that she could take out so many monsters, so many foes, so much thrown that was thrown at her, and yet she did anyway. She did it automatically, pausing her cuts and slashes only to make sure that no sound escaped her lips as she acted. No need for that particular punch in the gut, to add to all the small bruises, cuts, lumps, and sore muscles she gained by acting out.

 

And then, the truth was, none of it really mattered anyhow. The fact she acted did little to push her out of her spiral of self doubt. She just wasn’t feeling it.

 

Link marveled at her ability to keep repeating the same information in her mind, mulling over it and switching it several times over, but not really coming to a decision. She thought herself to have wits - though they were wasted on the fact she did not speak. She thought herself pretty clever - to the point of solving mysteries that had been placed on the fields of Hyrule eons ago. - and she thought herself a woman of action. That she had jumped into action, despite the dread and weight of her burden, almost as apparent as the grimace when Zelda had called him Link, proved just that.

 

But nobody could accuse her of being brief. Her thoughts were often such that she repeated them in a spiral of doubt, leaving her to doubt herself. Her hands kept busy, and to be in the battlefield took at least some amount of her focus, but whatever part of her mind was making snap decisions and reflecting on whether to dodge roll, climb, or counter was minute. Always there but not really registering.   
  
Link thought it clear by then that it was not the only thing always present, yet it was probably easier to name that her hidden desire, her innermost want. She could easily call it a battle spirit, or an intuition, or even pure, hard training. Things she couldn’t do with what in fact ailed her deep inside of her.

 

Link had had a vast pool of women to form her impressions of the concept. She hadn’t always been palace-ridden. No, she had met women who tended the fields, and women who engaged in fishing. She had met them as surely as she had met her princess and Lady Impa. Those had caused a greater impression on her - as most everything in palace had. But she still held dear to her the fact that, try as she might to copy the requinted form and grace of Ladies of the higher nobility, that was not the only way to be.   
  
And yet she failed anyhow. Or at least she felt that she had failed. Link didn’t know why it had bothered her so - why it was so strongly felt by her, the need to be referred as a she. It was a need of validation she didn’t feel in other areas. While being complimented on “his” skills in the field felt nice - other than the inward cringe at the way she was called - she didn’t have an utmost desire, an almost manic need for it like she did when it came to the issue.

 

Link remembered practicing at night, mouthing the words, for even then she did not speak, and doing dandy little gestures. Even then she had kept it a secret.    
  
Were she honest it hadn’t been a fear of reprisal. - she wrangled goats, she could take care of herself. - that had kept her actions a secret. Nobody had ever told her how she felt was wrong, but then she hadn’t ever shared it with anyone. Her mind did a good enough job reminding her of how unusual it was. She didn’t need the reminder, yet it was there, everytime she happened to catch an angle of herself on the hilt of her sword, or the reflection of her face on the shield of a sparring partner.    
  
That those images came distorted, bloated, at angles, didn’t matter to Link. Glancing at herself she felt the same way, off, weird,  _ wrong. _

 

It was actually a real disconcerting experience. To look upon one self and not recognise them. Link could see that it was her. That much was clear. But she just didn’t identify with the image.   
  
Once she had punched the reflection in her annoyance. That had been a mistake. She might have been strong, bullishly so, annoyingly so, strong enough that she wondered if that was the product of being something she was not - in her mind. - but the weapons and shields and especially the shiny armors used by her fellow soldiers - some she had worn as well, on  occasion, were stronger. It had not only been her ego, but also her hand that had been left aching and hurting.   
  
Link sighed, looking at her hands. Walking around and only very rarely visiting springs, she wasn’t surprised to find them dirty. Cackled with mud, blood, and what appeared to be oil. Her hands were not the only thing that was cackled in the mixture of substances, but the fact that her clothes - as well as her weapons - were in a similar state did little to alleviate matters. Her job was a messy, cruel one, and that left her with that problem. It wasn’t as if it was hard to clean herself up, there were creeks most everywhere in the land - with the exception of the deserts - but she often wondered what the point to scrubbing her hands clean was.   
  
It was an argument she had had heard repeated often, with different items _ But why must I make my bed, if I’m just going to lie down again _ , she remembered hearing as a child. The soldier training had mostly beaten that out of her. Hygiene was important in the battlefield, as was personal grooming. Link could say she understood. Hundreds of men in heavy armor all day training - and a girl tucked away in between the men - sometimes the smell got to be nauseating.

  
Just because she was alone, didn’t mean Link wouldn’t engage in cleaning herself up, in doing her best to present her best self - or at least a clean self, she didn’t have the courage for the rest much as it hurt her, much as she want to spill it. Were she honest, it wasn’t exactly pleasant, to walk covered in such grime, and sweat. There was little she could do about that fact - she sweated, it was only natural. And part of her was happy that at least in THAT she was overwhelmingly common, even if it wasn’t her favorite part of being - But she could at least say that she did so.   
  


She stared at her hands, thinking. She kept moving forward, weapons not drawn. Probably a foolish idea, but she was quick to the trigger - or rather the blade. The same minute part of her that helped her form battle plans - probably the only one not worried about her being, and who she was - would also detect danger. Two things stood out when she looked at her hands besides the dirtiness, which she mentally chided herself for, and promised to fix as soon as possible. The first was that, as if reminding herself of the time she had hit the shields in disgust, they still ached. Not a surprise, when she considered that she used her hands quite often, but it was easy to forget it in the midst of battle, when lost not on the violence, but on the question that still plagued her. Who she was, and how did she refer to herself. That alone was more intimidating.   
  
Which led her to the second thing she could notice about her hands. They were thick, and muscled and she hated that. It wasn’t completely unexpected, once more, and it was a damn near essential part of her job to be agile, she almost needed to be double jointed just to keep up, but still she hated it.   
  
It might have been a silly thing, her hands were perfectly functional as evidenced by the way she used them skillfully. She could shoot bows, swords, and even maces. They carried such strength that they often broke the weapons in her hand.   
  
And yet that was the thing, Link wouldn’t go as far as to say that strength wasn’t feminine - that was opening a whole can of worms that she did not care to go into. How could she say that when some of the strongest of beings she ever met had been had been women? When her princess had single handedly kept a dark presence at bay for a century because she had failed?

 

Link was aware that girls came in as many shapes and sizes as they were. She had heard tales of fish women, Zoras, she thought to have been how they were referred to as. She had seen country folk’s hands that rivaled just how caked with dirt hers were, and some fingers were even thicker.   
  
Yet Link couldn’t help herself. She couldn’t help but compare her stumpy little things, with the graceful and long ones Zelda had. She couldn’t even hope to change that. She’d sooner turn into a wolf, a bitch, than change her form.   
  
What were the chances of that happening? Looking at her hands, and her fingers Link couldn’t help but scoff at the notion, it’d have brought a chortle were it not for just out there it was, the root of a problem.

 

Link alternated in between acceptance and dread, for who she was. It wasn’t easily explained and in fact she had never attempted to. The sound of her grunt of annoyance at her hands had been soft, but then she had vocalised it like she did her grunts. Perhaps it was odd to fixate on fingers, perhaps it was weird to care so much about something so inconsequential.   
  
But it wasn’t the fingers, and she knew it. It was the fact women, or at least some women, had what she would never have. Her frame, though not exactly burly, was far too wide shouldered, and her body hair - though little, was still present. She could only sigh in annoyance. That Zelda was the monarch, that she had riches, that she had control over her, and authority over many others, those didn’t interest her half as much as her figure.   
  
It was weird because she knew what men - or those perceived as such - were supposed to feel. None would dare express it in front of commanders, but she could tell that Zelda was pretty. A fair maiden, she knew that she was the object of desire of many. Perhaps the only desire as far fetched as her desire to be treated as “She”.   
  
But Link could never separate the fact that she was pretty, from the fact she was so overwhelmingly feminine, almost to the point of bringing tears to her eyes. She sometimes caught the princess overlooking the exercise in the courtyard, and she had to remind herself not to stare, as that would be dangerous and rude. It wasn’t particularly easy to think about, and with Zelda gone, Link didn’t know why she brought it back into her mind over and over again. It was a comparison she couldn’t possibly win, and she knew it, but it was enough to make her stand still, which wasn’t a recent development, even back then she had to struggle not to stand still when she graced them with her presence.

 

Link had never been a girl to sit still - she had always been rambunctious and stopping to smell the flowers - as she was often advised to do - didn’t run through her mind very often. She preferred to jump into action.    
  
It also had a physical manifestation, whether it was a toe, a finger, or her head, sitting completely quiet, without moving had been a hard thing to achieve for her. By the time she had joined the Hylian army that had been something she had worked on, which was helped by the fact that she wished not to stand out, but still, it was rare.   
  
So those moments where Link looked at Zelda, admiration, jealousy, and a cornucopia of other confusing emotions running through her and playing on her face were somehow even odder than she was expecting. They were a rarity that became increasingly too common when the Princess was present.   
  
And she had failed her.  Such a thought kept running through Link’s mind. It wasn’t as intrusive or obtuse a thought as  _ the thing _ , but it was still present. If before she had held her hands open, to observe the griminess on the skin now she could only clench them.   
  
She would never admit to it, but the fact was that she had hoped Zelda, her princess, would have seen through the mask she was forced to use. There had been no reason for her to see it when she had been one amidst many a fighter, a woman in a regiment of men, but still she hoped. That she knew her name - that their fates were as interconnected as it seemed it had given her hope.

  
However Link still felt that such an act of kindness would never befall her.  Zelda might be a fair ruler - though what she ruled nowadays was very limited in scope - she might have been gentle, and she might have had time to listen to any of her subjects that came to her, and yet -   
  
There it was, that  _ yet  _ that made Link feel inadequate. How could she even think that? It just didn’t register as making sense. That her whole body screamed for it, that her mind fell into ill thoughts when she thought about how she had been treated an entire life - How was that a problem of the princess?   
  
Link wondered, however. That she could not stop, she wished, he felt, and though she wouldn’t vocalise his thoughts out loud - for a myriad of reasons, not all of them related to the sound of her voice, she couldn’t stop the little voice that went, “but what if”. Link did not know if that was her sense of self, her conscience or whatever the heck it was. - She had seen many a strange thing traveling the land, Perhaps it was a tiny fairy with only the desire to help her, and hence the land?   
  
Link did not know, what had Zelda called her? A hero? The words still stung, pushing her mood down even as she pushed a path to save her. What else was she to do? She had sworn loyalty.   
  
To think of herself, as a hero, or more properly a heroine, was still an odd thought. Sure, she had hoped to protect those in need, to do good by enrolling. In some fashion she felt that that was her duty. Something she had to do. And maybe doing good despite her condition, despite the fact she was as confused as she could possibly be, meant she was a heroine.   
  
The truth though, was that Link was just not feeling it. And the things she wasn’t feeling were many, and the thoughts she did have her a lot to deal with. But in between hand staring, in between weapon polishing and body washing. In between battles and periods of silence, in between walking and jogging, climbing and sliding, she did not feel it. And that was something she had to deal with.   
  
Soon enough, she hoped, for now she only had that certainty. Or lack thereof.

 

She focused on the way ahead and she moved. Much could be said about continuing to move forward, and she was sure that if she were the literary type - books like those she had seen in the castle, so long ago, she could have made an analogy or metaphor.   
  
Her head wasn’t into it, though, so she simply focused on the goal, even if she did not know what it was. Want or need? To be a girl, or to save the princess? She did owe Zelda a lot - and she supposed that was her ultimate goal, but that aching need still pressed on inside of her…

  
Link wasn’t feeling it. But that did not matter. Continuing the movement she only glanced ahead. Forward it was.

 

  
  
  


  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I originally hadn't meant to continue this tale. Having written the first chapter amidst a dysphoric attack, I thought it to have served its purpose as therapy.
> 
> A friend convinced me otherwise, the fact that through the simple act of writing, I can make her happy (or happier), pushes me forward. I do not know how many chapters I will add to this. But I hope that anyone reading enjoys the trip.
> 
> And if you, dear reader, do, why not leave a comment? Thank you.


	3. Chapter 3

Link was running out of time.   
  
Time was scarce, or, at least that was what it felt like to Link. She would have wondered where all her time had gone, but the flowers she had picked, the ones she had used to decorate the side of her bag, were answer enough. While her princess waited, Link had dedicated herself to collecting.   
  


It was probably not the best use of her time, she could safely say. It was probably a waste of time, resources, and something she should not do. If she wanted to pick flowers, she might as well do it after confronting the evils of the land.  That would probably be what her commander would have said, were they not lost to the sands of time. To get distracted by flowers of all things spoke depths about her handling of pressure.   
  
And yet, though it was not exactly what she was supposed to do, she found it oddly pleasurable. A touch of color in a drab brown world.  A dash of distraction, a push towards doing something so trivial and simple, yet so enjoyable.

 

She didn’t do it because it was typically a female activity, though that had played in her mind, no, she did it because it was a deviation. And maybe everything about her was a deviation - her mind did tell her that often enough, - maybe that was her own little act of rebellion, not jumping straight into action when she had had the chance, but the truth was, she had found it to be soothing.   
  
Being soothed was almost a necessity for Link. If her mind went into overdrive during combat, whenever she tried to sleep it was ten, if not twenty times worse. Combat didn’t fulfill her need for distraction, but staring at the stars up in the sky, nothing but her body against the ground, where she could feel  _ all _ the wrong parts -

 

Well, Link had to deal. She had to live her life as her best self, or so she told herself, before cowardness took over and she went silent once more, not daring bring it up, silently suffering for it.   
  
She thought - as a heroine - she was supposed to be brave. And yet she didn’t feel very much brave. That she had honed her skills on the battlefield, that was not something that had granted her the courage she lacked. Fighting, fighting was easy, but dealing with what she felt that was far more complicated. Link didn’t know if she would ever have the strength to do it, quite honestly.

 

Her methods of coping, of soothing herself varied. She did not find wanton relief in the destruction of evil’s bane, though that was what she did most often. She did enjoy sword play, as a theoretical thing. She found it fun to practice and slash up training dummies, though she hadn’t done that in a literal century, the problem was that to bear the burden of saving Hyrule she had to take those skills and apply them. Flesh and bone did splinter and though Link was aware that was her duty, sometimes she wondered if she was doing more harm than good.   
  
Flower picking was another thing she did not indulge much in, it certainly did not see as much use as her sword abilities. On quiet days, though, were combat was little, and her steps were many she took that little detour. After all what was there to lose except time?   
  
Time was something she was running out of. She could easily tell herself that if Zelda had waited 100 years she could await a couple more days, but then that would be selfish of her. She had promised her her loyalty, and she owed her her survival, so she at least try to help. Her need to help didn’t come from those factors, her loyalty, the fact Zelda had in all likelihood saved her life, though they were there, but rather a deep sense of right and wrong.   
  
It was really  a no brainer. Perhaps it had to do with indoctrination, Link did not know, but it was hard to see Ganon as anything other than evil. Link might not have had the best life in the past, she might have been confronted with her inner self, her doubts and her worries. She might have found guard duty a bore - even if did give her occasional glimpses at Zelda. 

  
But that did not mean she had wanted her world destroyed, everything she had known gone. There were times - days even, where she felt sort of glad for it, because she was nothing if not a coward, and that way she hadn’t had to deal with her issues or at least had had to tell others, but those days came accompanied by an overwhelming amount of guilt. How could she ever think that to be a good thing? It gave strength to the argument that her mind often repeated that she was most unusual. That was putting it mildly, what her mind really yelled at her was more like a series of expletives - her mind lashing out at her body for how sick and wrong it felt, and pushing her around for the ride, but Link had to cope.

 

Perhaps it was selfish of her to prioritise her own mental well being over the salvation of the kingdom. Perhaps it was not what was expected of her. It was a moral dilemma, Link had  heard the theoretical question placed by fellow soldiers once.    
  
“If it meant it would save many a innocent, would you die for them? Or would you save yourself first?”   
  
There had been jeers, and everyone had whistled that, no, they would save the innocent. That had been what they had signed up for. Everyone had family or friends to think about. And they would be honored to fight for the people of Hyrule and all of its creatures.

 

Her mental health might not have been a matter of life and death, not really, but it sure felt like it. And Link was running out of time, and she was delaying the confrontation more and more, but she felt it was important to be in the right mental state.   
  
Perhaps that was a justification for her hesitation. She did not know. If Link were honest she didn’t really fear confronting the Evil one himself. What was there to change? It might be a bigger challenge than any other foe she had ever confronted, but Link did not fear death. She did not embrace it either, she hadn’t quite reached that point. But she would do her duty...well she would eventually.   
  
Succeeding was a far more daunting prospect than dying at the hands of Ganon. To face her princess, to see her, and to be thanked as  _ Link _ , that was - she was not looking forward to that. A sort of choke gasp came out of Link’s throat as she thought about it. She had heard Zelda was kind, and good, and of course she was very pretty, but the question that rang through her mind again and again was the same she had had a century earlier, and which had made her never reveal her true self.

 

Link wanted to believe that Zelda would react adequately to it. She highly doubted she would react positively, yet Link hoped not for a negative reaction. That Zelda had called her Link, and referred to her as the hero was, she hoped, something that came out of the lack of awareness of her condition. It was a princess duty to know her people, that much was true, but this was a hugely intimate detail Link had never ever shared with anyone.

 

She spread out her arms, as if in a gesture of protest. The flowers which she had picked dangled from her clothes and sack, and as she walked she caught glimpses of them, which made her smile, despite all that. She might not want to think about  _ that _ , but she still considered that her time picking up flowers hadn’t been lost time.   
  
It had put her in a pinch. While Zelda hadn’t contacted her, Link was aware that she was running out of time. It had been an indulgence to go and pick them, and they served no useful purpose besides looking pretty, yet Link didn’t regret it. She might get hung up on what ifs and maybes, on what might have been and what could have been, but this she was sure was not something that would cost her. Whether or not it costed Zelda, who was holding her own in a surely exhausting process was another thing, but Link could not dare think about that.

 

She didn’t mean to sound flippant when she said she had her own issues to deal with. She didn’t mean to imply that she would never help Zelda, or those in need. The fact that she was suffering as well didn’t mean that she was set to focus only on her woes. Zelda had had struggles Link could barely comprehend, Zelda held herself - and so much more - together by pure strength of will! It was something Link really admired about her princess, and she would never take away her credit for that.

 

She wished to lighten Zelda’s burden greatly. She wished to help alleviate matters. Link wished for a lot of things, for her character was a complex one. She sometimes felt defined by her title, and by the amount of mooks she mindlessly slashed her sword at. She worried about that, a little bit. Was she seen as a brute? And then by who was she seen?   
  
Link had discovered settlements, and gazed at them from afar. That her knowledge of such places that had sprung up was little helped her justify the fact she did not care to visit them. She had never been a social butterfly, and the times she had interacted in a friendly setting with people, those tended to be awkward.   
  


So Link had glanced, and she had set foot on the road, and there had been times where she had come close to approaching. There had been times where she had changed directions mid step only to decide that it was not a worthy endeavor to subject herself to that. As a hero (hero, how she dreaded that word), she was set in helping others, and she did try to act on such a manner whenever possible.   
  
But her traveling companions were few, and her attempts at settling in between settlements had obviously failed. Link thought herself a helpful soul, she didn’t have the monetary means nor the resources she needed to help everyone, but she had will. That Link didn’t even register what the new  currency of the land was, that she scavenged most of her material out of old relics and holes on the ground, opened maws to the earth, dark like tombs, meant she had little use for it.   
  
But if there was one thing Link had known it had been grief. She knew loss, she knew pain, and she knew doubt, and so she attempted to help. It wasn’t a purely altruistic decision, in that she got something out of it, but her intentions were pure. That she was paid despite her protests was more of an afterthought, after all, she didn’t speak, so she couldn’t simply say “no thank you”.

  
Those she had met had weird little quirks to their manners of speaking, though Link did not comment on it. She supposed it to be an evolution of the language. It was a silly thought, but it gave Link hope that at least that aspect of his old land had endured. Things were not as prosper, nor as good as they had once been. Link had seen with her own eyes how the land had changed, and maybe it was a mulish sense of pride and nostalgia, but she thought things to have changed for the worse. But that there had been an effort to recoup, recover, and resettle was inspiring despite all.

 

She supposed that that was the greatest ability of civilized races, to rebuild, reform, reconstruct. To keep going even after disaster had struck. A disaster, Link’s mind added, that was directly her responsibility, at least somewhat. No matter how many times she tried to assure herself otherwise, she still felt the heavy hints of desperation. For she was reminded of what she could have done rather than what she had done.

 

It was a morbid thought, but one Link had often. Though she knew that dwelling on the past would lead her nowhere - not when she had failed, she couldn’t help herself. She was a relic of that past. A champion of none, forgotten by time. And most.   
  
Perhaps that was what she desired. That was the worse part. As she drove steel, and fought fiercely, she could not help herself. Rage helped, but only to a certain point. And there were things Link wasn’t dealing with.   
  
Not even the big thing, or obvious things. Not even the fact that as cold steel had perforated her chest she had thought not of Hyrule - the Hyrule she had failed, but that she would die as a man. Known only as such. That it wasn’t fair.   
  
She was supposed to be selfless. To give everything for her princess, and yet, in that moment she had a weakness. How could she confront her after that? How could she confront any of the ones she had dared call friends?   
  
She didn’t remember if she had said something, as she was held, or if her attempts had led her nowhere, due to the fact her wounds sapped her strength. She didn’t know which was preferably, honestly.    
  
Link had never felt the urge to give up. To simply stop. Though she ran on auto-pilot on occasion an occasion that had become increasingly more common as time passed, the thoughts that plagued her mind had never been enough for that. Link settled, she conformed, and she bitterly agreed to do whatever was in her mind. And there were days where her strength, comparable to that of an ox was beneficial as there were days where her strength only helped her mind attack her, for it was one more thing to add to the list of things she considered wrong.  As there were days where she had to hurry up, and there were days where she stopped to pick up flowers.   
  
After all, stopping to smell the flowers was an idiom she had heard repeated often enough. And while she didn’t much use her sense of smell - whatever the pleasantness of flowers, they couldn’t exactly compare to the overwhelming stench of sweat and mud cackled on her - she thought the sentiment applied.   
  
Because seeing Hyrule rebuild itself gave her hope. It gave her a hope that perhaps - just maybe - she could still redeem herself. That she didn’t do it for cheering crowds, or for adoration that much was clear. Even if the language had changed, and so had the accents, even if there were bad days and good days.    
  
She didn’t know if the idiomatic expression about smelling the flowers, that was, enjoying life, still existed in this time. She had no idea, but the general sentiment still applied. Link was in an unique position in that she could fend for herself, much as she hated the methods she used to do it.   
  
She was running out of time, perhaps, that much was true. It wouldn’t be fair to Zelda to delay her journey on distractions, vain, dumb distractions. There was a feeling of self indulgence in picking flowers. There was a sense of guilt as well.   
  
And yet, even so Link had to break. She had to pause once in a while. It was just as natural a rest as pausing after pushing through to the top of a high peak. Tired minds wanted rest above all else. As battered bodies did. And some might claim it not equivalent. That she had been healed of all injuries.

 

Link did not think that to be true, after all that time. Her body felt rejuvenated, and if she had once felt herself bleeding, her lungs failing, as she grasped for air, that was no longer the case. Maybe Zelda hadn’t known, maybe that had been beyond the abilities of magic to fix.   
  
But link settled, she conformed, she did her best. That was all that she could do even if it was less than what was asked of her. And Link felt a determination to help, and Link felt guilt, and she felt anger. But one thing she did not feel was the need to let herself into exhaustion.   
  
She still cared. She was still resigned. And yes, she was really running out of time.   
  
But she still stopped to smell the flowers. Or pick them, as the case might be. Though she felt guilt about it, that would not change. Some things might, such as her attempts at interaction, or her name, but others wouldn't’.   
  
And she was glad for it. Once more Link lay on the ground, and once more night provided her with time to reflect. Sleep didn’t elude her, but it didn’t come easily either. At last she fell asleep.    
  
Time was short, but then, days were many. And there would be new ones.  She had made her decision, and she would probably regret it in the morning, doubt it, and yet act on it.    
  
Not that night though. That night she slept, safe, flowers to her chest, and to her legs.

 

  
  
  
  



	4. Chapter 4

Sometimes Link felt like she languished in self pity, stretching out what could be her woes, her concerns and her worries, and stretching them to a point where she was not the only one affected by them. No, they affected everyone, with how they affected her actions.   
  
It was stalling, she was well aware of that. And though guilt ran through her, and though the flowers she had woken up to were something she couldn’t even face, as she had crumpled them towards the bottom of her bag, like a bin of useless junk she carried through, she couldn’t quite bring herself to regret that time spent.

  
She was aware that she should. She was aware of a lot of things she should have done, and could have done, and obligations, and demands, and wishes, and even hopes placed on her. She was aware that she was supposed to do more than what she had done. And yet, she didn’t, much.   
  
It got to be tiresome. That she felt to be the truth. Her mind repeated the same old two or three topics at a constant speed, a loop that she couldn’t quite escape. Her body pushed her into despair, or at least as close to despair as she could afford to fall, as a hero(ine). Enough was enough, she told herself often, and yet she didn’t quite have the self control or the ability to stop the same old topics from coming. It was violent, it was visceral, it wasn’t as graphic as the job she did, freeing the land from Ganon’s followers, but it left as big of a mark, if not more. And she repeated her swings, and she repeated her inner screaming, afraid of opening up her mouth.    
  
Link listened, and she tried to accept what was said about her, as if that was a task that came easy to her. But then she had never had an easy task, not really. She didn’t begrudge Zelda, her princess, or whomever for how they expected her to act, but were she totally honest with herself, she wasn’t exactly pleased with it.

 

Link often flip flopped between those two states of being. Her face, she was sure, was a contort of emotions. She couldn’t see it, except when she caught side of herself by a puddle, or the reflected material of her shield or blade, and that was fine with her, because she didn’t want to see it. To see her face - more than anything her stubble, that was something she didn’t want to see. She did her best not to, and so could only imagine how much of an anachronistic picture that painted. Link sighed, there was a fancy word, one she had in the court, and she had heard slipping out of her princess’ lips once. She supposed that was the definition, the literal scripted and written description, that best applied to her.   
  
Like an old art piece, except no one admired her for her beauty, or her figure, but rather for her actions. Link kept telling herself that she wasn’t vain enough to care about how others interpreted her looks, as she was not brave enough to put on female garments. What for? The ones she currently wore were stained to lorule and beyond! But were she honest with herself the problem had never been how others saw her, but how she saw herself. A warrior was ideally not given to emotions, and while Zelda, her princess had never told her to bottle everything up, while she had never exactly said it in as many words, and Link liked to believe she would have tried to understand, she had faltered.   
  
Her friend.  It was something she could never forget, and yet didn’t come to mind often. Zelda wasn’t only someone she had sworn herself to. She wasn’t just some wise ruler that she vowed to keep safe, she was so much more. It was tempting to fall back on the fact she had failed to protect her friend. Link hesitated on the thought. It would be easy to place her feeling of unease on that. She kept doing it, in fact, it was clearly an escape.   
  
An escape that provided no relief. Amidst all the wandering, amidst the lies she told herself, that she was gathering her strength and her resources to fight the darkness that threatened to spread - amidst all the attempts to gain the courage to interact, and help, and just be...amidst all of that, and the clenching of teeth. Amidst the way her eyes shone, defiant, and the way her muscles tensed (and how she hated it), she still didn’t escape.    
  


Link considered herself far from perfect, and any attempts at perking up, at increasing her self esteem, were dashed by her mind and its constant cries of wrong. Wrong, and bad, and -  Link had yet to find a way to silence that voice. But in many ways she prefered when it focused on her body, her failings, than when she focused on the landscape around her, and how she had failed it.   
  
It  was something she had to live with every day. Every mile, every step, every look at the land. And though at first when she had woken up she thought it all to be desolated, gray if not yellow she has seen little glimpses of life. Nature overtaking hardships, and sprouting. Those did little to dispel the bile on the back of her throat, and the weight on her chest.

 

And on and on, and again and again her mind pushed those thoughts onto her. It was something she didn’t appreciate, but she couldn’t quite deny as truth. And while Link had been around Zelda to know the truth as subjective - she was a leader and had to withhold information after all -  that didn't mean it didn’t affect her.

 

And in many ways Link was proactive, and acted before the problems became bigger. In many ways Link had anticipated herself so that they didn’t become a heap. She liked to think she had always managed to manage them. Well most of the time, anyway.   
  
But then that was her biggest failing. That in every single person trusting her she hadn’t thought herself capable of failing. Not, at least, to such a scale as she had failed. And Link could tell herself that the responsibility hadn’t fallen entirely within her person, within her frame. And Link could try justifying it with a dozen and one excuses. She could, but she didn’t even merited that thought, she didn’t even dignify it with an attempt.

  
Because really what could Link say?  _ I’m sorry _ , failed to adequately describe just how big her failings were. That she truly did feel sorry wasn’t the point, and how could she even remotely approach the point? What could she possibly say?   
  
Link hadn’t spoken much then, and she had spoken even less now. There were a myriad of reasons why she didn’t and not all of them were as valid as the others. If she could try to qualify how valid they were, she doubted it. But then she doubted a lot of things, and while she considered herself smart to a point - not as wise as Zelda, but capable of rational thinking - she often let her emotions get the best of her.

 

And there it went again, her languishing, her avoidance of the topic, her loop of negative feedback provided by her own mind. Honestly Link was very much tired of it. It had become her existence, it had become routine. Her mind brought her down, but Link truly didn’t feel like she needed much to fall down to that level. It wasn’t only guilt, it wasn’t only the feeling of being - well herself, a girl. And while Link would very much like to pretend it was that, something she had never mentioned to any other soul, because that at least she could keep down even if it killed her, that wasn’t it.

 

She didn’t know what it was. She didn’t have a word for it, only a hunch. Much like she didn’t have a reason for wanting to be treated as a girl other than the fact it felt right. Did she need anything else? A reason?  Link did not know and her mind was too busy putting her down, to actually provide her with an answer.   
  
Not that her mind wasn’t sharp, or that her inklings weren’t usually somewhat accurate. If Link spoke, she’d call it a gut feeling. But then, it had been so long since she had referred to it as such that she could only remember it as a vague memory. Like something that had happened long ago. She guessed it had been a century after all.   
  
What she did remember were the constant utterances of “Sir” and “Lad”, and “mister”. Those had stuck with her, as if they were evidence to what she could never had. And her eyes, always held a look of irreverence, bright and fiery, but her lips had been pursed even then. Perhaps she had been thought of as petulant. Perhaps her attempts at not sticking out had been feeble, but there was little she could do about that.

 

And sure, for as much action as she had in her life, for as many battles, and swings, and cuts, and slashes,  her greatest battle was with her mind. Her concerns always obvious, her thoughts always in disarray. And be them four or four hundred, Link can’t help but sigh. It didn’t make much of a difference to her. Nothing did .   
  
She can claim that her princess, her friend, that she owes her at least a try to help. That it was partially her fault for faltering, for failing. And at that she scowls at the flowers that offer a sickly smell, the ones she dropped deep in her bag, as if that could make her forget about them. What was she thinking? She surely was to fight, no?

  
But Link felt scared. That was the truth, and it shocked even her, stopping her, an arm half raised, hanging precariously from a ledge. How long had she known? Perhaps she had always known. She had certainly joked about it enough, turning herself into a target for harassment. Self deprecation, that was easier than to actually try to improve things….

  
And she wanted to dismiss the thought but it just didn’t go away as pesky thoughts never went away. And Link can’t tell if she’s thinking about the past - the past where she had failed, so spectacularly - or the present, where she threatens to fail once more. And Link felt glad that she didn’t have nary a puddle nearby, hanging on the ledge like that. Not only because seeing her face would have caused her pain, but also because she would have been confronted by how much it affected her. Link knew it to be causing her pain, she knew herself to want to dismiss it. But seeing it?   
  
And, amazingly, once she admits to herself that she’s scared things start to snowball. Because it’s easy to joke about it, make it all a big pretense, as if it’s not something that she truly felt, but it was harder to deal with it, in a purely straight manner.

 

Zelda had tried making a leader out of her, and Link had never been up to the task. Zelda had intervened and she had shaped her training, she had expected great things out of her. They had talked, and a friendship had blossomed, and Link had done her best, and yet that hadn’t been enough.

 

A word came to her lips, and for the first time in ages she spoke. Angst. Because that was what defined her life, what she felt every waking moment and what stopped her dreams from being pleasant wasn’t it? Angusty. Angst.

 

Her breath was labored, and her chest rose as she attempted to combat her shortness of breath with deep, long pushes of air into her lungs. The vastness of the world expanded into the horizon, she could look below her, she could look ahead of her. She could see light blue forms glowing into the horizon which she assumed to be rivers, from how the sun struck them, leading them to glow, and she could see paths, paths that had to lead somewhere. Link had always considered her vision to be sharp. Not perfect, nothing in her was without flaws she could find, but it gave reason for her eyes to exist, other than being, as she had often heard,cute.

 

She could see what looked like amalgamates of buildings, far off in the distance, she could see figures in the distance, no more than dots, and she could see green. That surprised her, How could she have not caught wind of it before? How could she had not have breathed the wilderness?   
  
She looked back, she had passed settlements before, and she had never entered them. Though they filled her with hope, due to the fact that some semblance of civilization remained, she didn’t think herself capable of interacting, not when it was her fault the world had gone to heck.   
  
But that was something she intended to change. Looking at how far she had traveled, hundreds of miles, though not enough to completely hide the dark stormy overcast sky behind her, she couldn’t help but nod.   
  
She had felt like cattle, pushed around to suit the needs of others. And she was happy to help, she truly was! There were certain things, however that she couldn’t delay for much further.   
  
She had hangups, as many often did. And maybe speaking in a very general sense, as if she were one of many was dehumanising the situation, and Link was clever enough to realise that, but if that was how it would go, she had no complaints. Not any she’d vocalise anyway.   
  
There were things worth fighting for, Zelda, her kingdom, but she also had to fight for herself. Maybe the cold mountain air had cleared her head, and allowed to see it. And, being honest with herself, Link strongly felt she’d step back, hesitate and falter in her resolution. But for the moment she felt nice.   
  
She noticed a particular colorful shape, and though she was much too far to hear it, she could almost imagine the light out of the dot. Something about the creature’s shape tugged at her memories. Its form, at least, was not too similar to her own.   
  
She grabbed the hand glider, and took a leap of faith.   
  
She had to keep moving forward.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this at 6am, after a dysphoric moment that woke me up. In fact it's pretty much a sort of therapy, a way to deal with my issues. Henceforth it's not edited. And repetition might be common.
> 
> If you enjoyed it, please comment. Thank you.


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